


fleeting, not fading

by riverbed



Category: Hamilton - Miranda
Genre: Cuddling, F/M, Family, Fluff, Modern AU, just a little reflection, parenting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-02-08
Updated: 2016-02-08
Packaged: 2018-05-19 00:28:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,300
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5949172
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/riverbed/pseuds/riverbed
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>love is just finishing each other’s sentences, and a healthy dose of acceptance.</p>
            </blockquote>





	fleeting, not fading

**Author's Note:**

> this is the first time i've ever set out to write porn and had it turn out to be Not Porn At All. enjoy The Tamest Fic.
> 
> philip would be 18 here, making their youngest a newborn and these stupid-cute parents in middle age.

Alexander studies the screen before him, adjusts the brightness back and forth in an absolutely vain attempt to find a setting on which the light doesn’t glare so painfully into his eyes. Upon realizing the futility, he glares down at the papers he’s transcribing, some offensively boring bill drafts. Washington knows his second-least favorite thing to do is to read Thomas Jefferson’s handwriting, but then again, he often expects him to endure his first-least favorite thing, listening to Thomas Jefferson speak, so Alexander supposes maybe he doesn’t care.

He yanks his glasses off, holding their thin stem between his thumb and forefinger as he rests his head in his palm, kneading his forehead. He swears that he can feel his frown lines deepening day by day.

He looks up without actually moving his head, and Eliza is in the archway to the family room, her hip cocked against the frame, looking tired but beautiful.

“Kids down?” he asks, and she nods. “Even the little ones?” He tilts his face to look at her, now, and a small smile plays at the corner of her lip in acknowledgement - a smile he treasures particularly, as only he tends to be able to catch it. “I do know what I’m doing, dear,” she says, in a tone that makes it obvious she’s playing along.

“Don’t you ever,” he affirms, sighing as she crosses the room to plop down next to him on the sofa, the papers shifting as her weight settles. “Wish I did.”

“You do a pretty good job of convincing everybody you know what you’re talking about,” Eliza teases. “And even if they don’t think so, they couldn’t get a word in edgewise, anyway.” She looks him up and down, says, “I don’t know why you sit on this couch to work when you have not one but two perfectly good desks in this house, one of which is in an office! Remember that room? We put it together just for your work!”

Alexander turns back to his laptop. “You know exactly why, and it’s because I sit in an office all day. Change of scenery. Besides, there’s too many books in my office, and the kids know to look for me there. If they have to come all the way down here from two floors up, there’s a chance they’ll run into you and you’ll stop them.”

She chuckles, hugging her knees to her chest and shivering a little. “It’s cold down here.” She knows the reason for that, too - keeps him from getting sleepy. “What are you working on?” Eliza asks in the way she does each day, always interested, never out of obligation. He loves her for it. As if he needed another reason.

He drags a hand down his cheek, distorting his features. “Don’t remind me. These are drafts of Jefferson’s, and they’re impenetrable.” He narrows his eyes at a passage, groans in frustration. “What is the man even talking about?”

“Jefferson doesn’t type up his own finals?”

"We trade off. It was Washington’s idea. An exercise in empathy, or something. I think we need an exercise in hiring someone whose job it is to do this.”

“Well, I’ll bet Thomas has just as much fun deciphering all the things you write when it’s his turn.”

Alexander allows himself a dreamy smile. “Oh, I put extra effort into those, just for him.” He says it as if he is recalling a fond memory. Then he wrinkles his nose in distaste. “Why do you insist on calling him Thomas?” He spits the name like he is expelling poison.

“Because I’m a civilized person who sees him for what he is - multi-dimensional, just like you,” she says gently, leaning forward to push a thick lock of stray hair that has come loose from his ponytail back behind his ear. “And I believe that people deserve the respect,” she chides even as she strokes his scalp, “of being called their given or chosen name, and not being doomed to the names of their fathers.” She knows this will land stinging on Alexander - she has made the point before, and he has never reacted well to it, though he has also never thrown a full-on tantrum - just pouted like the world was unfair, and really, what else is new?

Tonight seems to be an argumentative night. Eliza had forgotten that staring at the ideas of his enemies for hours tends to do that to him. She winces as she watches the possible avenues pass through Alexander’s mind, watches him consider where he could take this, and is somewhat relieved when he settles on the most obvious. “Don’t compare the two of us,” he says quietly, his warning voice, and plants his tongue planted firmly in his cheek, tapping away at his keyboard and doggedly not looking at her.

“I don’t want to do this tonight,” she tells him. It leaves nothing for discussion. She continues threading her fingers through his hair, making it clear that she is not drawing away, that she is not forfeiting but redirecting. Alexander is so often closed-off, and for all his waxing poetic about change, refuses to hear anything that might conflict in the slightest with his worldview, especially when the opposition could be right. Eliza knows she is the one thing that can change his mind, and it is more like a burden than an honor, though she will never admit it. She pushes for the small successes in his most stubborn moments, celebrating even the tiniest shift in his normally-dogmatic approach.

Alexander seems to consider her words, then her proximity, and make a decision. He shuts his laptop, dumping it along with his papers onto the carpet, and leans into her; she lets her legs fall away from each other and frame him so he can lay back against her. He sighs and shuts his eyes almost immediately. Eliza looks upon him with pride, with astonishment. She wants to hold him here forever, at his most vulnerable, at his most beautiful, open and warm and content, his weight steady and comforting.

There are moments when everything is too much - more often than not, nowadays, with seven children, the youngest just an infant and the rest all pretty much with their own interests, Philip still living at home but on the verge of college in a few short months, the school-age kids all having sports and clubs to be taxied to and from at all hours, the toddler constantly babbling as much completely self-assured nonsense as his father.

There are moments Eliza is overwhelmed, surrounded by a swarming storm of impending panic - a threat to her dignity, an affront to her enduring grace. In those moments she wants to retreat and somehow Alexander always manages to be there just when she needs him most, an anchor when the chaos wants to uproot her, and he lets her hide, protects her for as long as she needs, or he doesn’t, draws her strength out and lets her feel it, forces her to breathe through it as it courses through her; together they manage to be just what they need to come up against whatever is thrown at them.

Yes, there are moments when things refuse to stop. But there are also divine moments of nothing, absolutely godsent glimpses of the way they still manage, after 20 years, to calm each other; they are accustomed to provocation, yes, but only when the other needs it. With that comes how adept they are at reading just what it is the other needs; the intrinsic ability to pick up where the other left off. Like finishing each other’s sentences, but more profound, like finishing each other’s souls; and Eliza smiles, thinking of all the sentences she’s finished for him.


End file.
